SUCCESSFUL TIPPING 



very quick decision and the capacity to accept or put 

 aside the information supphed. A case in point was 

 in 1906, Spearmint's year. 



My Newmarket correspondent, Archibald FrankHn, 

 telephoned to me one evening from Newmarket that 

 he was coming up that night as he wanted to see me 

 very particularly. The appointment was made, and 

 he arrived soon after ten o'clock. I could see there 

 was something rather extraordinary to be told me. 

 Thereupon he gave me every detail of the gallop he had 

 seen that morning between Spearmint and Pretty 

 Polly, and how the Derby candidate had held the 

 great mare. " Mind you," he added, " I want you to 

 take this from me. I am quite prepared for others not 

 accepting what I have told you as correct, for they will 

 not understand that it is possible for a three-year-old 

 at a difference of anything under two stone to be able 

 to go with Polly. Already they are turning it down 

 at Newmarket, for the simple reason that they didn't 

 see the gallop ! Some of the touts were at home, and 

 others on the other side of the town, where some good 

 work was being done. Now what I want to tell you 

 is," he emphasised, " that / have seen the winner of the 

 Derby ; nothing can beat him." He added that he 

 didn't know the exact weight between them, but he 

 didn't think for a moment there was more than a 

 difference of twenty pounds, if as much. 



Now Franklin is a very good judge of racing ; he has 

 his in-and-out spells of luck, but it never affects his 

 clear vision of what is likely to happen. He will argue, 

 yes, and is as dogmatic as those he comes in touch with, 

 but he has the canny characteristics of his native 

 county of Yorkshire when seriously considering an 

 important topic. It was an intuition to accept his 

 judgment, and straight away Spearmint was taken as a 



190 



